Tremendous changes have been occurring in the Internet that influence our everyday lives. For example, online social network sites have become the new meeting grounds. They have been called the new power lunch tables and new golf courses for business life in the U.S.
Moreover, many people are using such online social network sites to reconnect themselves to their friends, their neighborhood, their community, and the world.
The development of such online social networking sites touch countless aspects of our everyday lives, providing instant access to people of similar mindsets, and enabling us to form partnerships with more people in more ways than ever before. However, because there are so many different sites, it is often difficult to decide with which social networking site to participate.
Sometimes, a deciding factor includes which of your known friends, co-workers, family, or the like, are already members of a particular social networking site. Determining whether these people are current members may be performed by providing the social networking site with a list of your friends, co-workers, family members, or the like, and requesting the site to let you know if they are currently a member. However, this is often a non-exhaustive search, especially, should you forget to provide a name, phone number, or similar identifier. Therefore, opportunities may be lost to the potential member, as well as to the social networking members, and even the owner of the site, when the potential member decides not to participate. Thus, there is a desire to provide improved information to a potential member of a social networking site that is useable to help in determining whether to become a member. Therefore, it is with respect to these considerations and others that the present invention has been made.